Writer in Residence

St Cuthbert's Final Journey

The Leverhulme funded residency provides writer Richard W Hardwick the opportunity to work alongside students and staff across the Colleges to combine ethnographic and archival research, writing and photography to research and celebrate the return of St Cuthbert's Gospel to Durham.

On Sunday 21st April A group of students, staff and SCR members [around 40 people] from Ustinov walked the pilgrim's way to Lindisfarne with Richard Hardwick who is writer in residence at Ustinov College and Josephine Butler College and the School of Applied Social Sciences. We waved him off on his journey to re-trace the steps the monks carrying the body of St Cuthbert and the St Cuthbert Gospel took from Lindisfarne to Durham as they fled the Viking invasion. They eventually settled in Durham, where the great Norman cathedral was built in honour of St Cuthbert.

See press accounts in The Chronicle Live, the Northern Echo and Sky Tyne & Wear News and see Look North and Songs of Praise for more media publicity

See Richard's blog and the Lindisfarne Gospels programme for more information

Contacts: Richard W Hardwick

We are welcoming Richard back to Durham on Saturday 4th May at 12.30 on Palace Green. Richard would like to invite you to the following: A Tour of Durham Cathedral – 12.30pm, Saturday 4th May 2013 ending at the Shrine of St Cuthbert. This tour costs £5 per person and lasts approximately one and a half hours.

There will also be a trip to Bedesworld in June.

St. Paul's Church has been a place of Christian worship for over 1300 years and was home to the Venerable Bede, priest, monk, scholar of Jarrow and England’s first historian. It contains the oldest stained glass window in the world. Nearby Bede’s World is a museum dedicated to the life and times of Bede and to celebrating Anglo-Saxon cultural achievements, including a working example of a reconstructed Anglo-Saxon farm.

Enjoy a guided tour around both places, take part in hands-on stone carving (participants get to keep what they have crafted) and listen to a story-teller around the fire in an Anglo-Saxon hall. Meet the curatorial team and handle some rare 7th century artefacts. There is a £10 charge for this event but it will be subsidised by the University.

We will also be in touch with dates/venues for photography and creative writing workshops with Richard following his return.